“Our Priority”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: Mark 12:38-44
“…she
out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”
All
proper and good school teachers want to show, lead, guide, and teach
their students how to make the best choices in certain situations; yes,
during their time in school, but also, especially in their life’s
situations.
Just this past Wednesday, I wrote the following message on the overhead
projector in my classroom:
Joy within personal relationships is important.
Education is important.
Make the choice to place learning algebra as your first
priority during your time in this classroom.
And, actually, I would like to report
that some of my classes were a little more focused.
This is the same kind of lesson our life’s most important teacher is
offering us today; how to make the best choice in our life.
Our number one priority ought to be our personal relationship
with God, our heavenly Father. There
are many decisions we have to make in our worldly, daily lives; but the
most important decision we may make in our spiritual lives is to choose
our relationship with God the Father to be the highest value within our
hearts.
In our lectionary readings this year, we have spent a great deal of time
in the Gospel according to Mark. Mark
is quite different, from, let’s say, Luke.
Luke tends to smooth out all the rough edges.
No Gospel is more self-consciously artistic than Luke.
Not Mark! In the
beginning of Mark’s Gospel there is not one word about the family of
Jesus or his birth. Jesus
is simply shown as thrusting himself into the world.
Everything is at a fast pace.
Immediately Jesus did this.
Immediately Jesus did that.
The word “immediately” is used throughout Mark’s writing.
Jesus is now on his way to the cross.
And on his way to the cross, Jesus stops to give the scribes, the
religious, academic leaders of the day, one more tongue lashing.
Jesus has called them every name in the book.
In Mark’s Gospel, even more so than any of the others, Jesus
has no respect for authority. The
authorities have hated him from the very first.
Now, he calls them hypocrites.
He says to beware of the religious leaders because they like to walk
around in sophisticated robes, and they want to be noticed and honored
in the market places, at banquets and in the synagogues.
And they are famous for articulating long impressive prayers.
They have made decisions in their lives that have put them in
places of authority; they have served themselves to receive respect and
at the same time, they are so deceitful that they actually use their
authority behind the scenes to do such things as take into their own
possession the very houses of widows.
There is such a thing as spiritual abuse.
Believe me, there are pastors out there today who have this
attitude: “God has called me to lead this church and any who oppose me
will suffer the consequences from the Lord.”
Of course, the truth is those who will suffer are not hurt by the
Lord, but by the pastor who thinks he or she is standing in the Lord’s
place.
Where are people abused? Women
are usually abused in an intimate relationship.
And for an abused child, the most dangerous place is in the home.
Spiritually, what Jesus is teaching us, is that
where true authority is not understood, even in the church there can be
spiritual abuse where people are manipulated by those in authority to
serve them, instead of being ministered to in promoting what should be
our highest priority, our personal relationship with God the Father,
through the Holy Spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Next, Jesus walked over to where the treasury was
at the temple in Jerusalem. It must have been a place where people would simply walk over
any time they wanted and drop money into some kind of large container.
He probably sat there for a long time; watched lots of people
drop in their offerings. And one of the first things he noticed was that they were
merely giving out of their abundance.
Jesus is not saying that this is wrong.
When we give our offerings in the church, we usually give out of
what we think we can afford based on our budgets.
We want to support the church and give to church because we do
feel blessed at times in our church.
What Jesus saw in the poor lady giving all that she had, in two little
coins that added up to about a penny, was exactly what Jesus was doing
in his own life. He knew
through his own prayer life with God the Father, through his own growth
in his understanding of who He is in relationship to our heavenly Father
that he was going to offer his life for the salvation of all the
children of God.
This poor widow was showing to Christ that in her heart of hearts she
knew that her life was in the hands of God.
The most important aspect of her life, regardless of all the
suffering that she had gone through, was her relationship with God.
The main moral philosophy in the Greek world in the days of Christ was
“In all things – moderation.”
We may in some ways seek the same kind of visions today.
We do not want to be extreme in much of what we do.
We want simple lives. We
want ordered finances. We
want good health. And there
is a good value in having a somewhat simple life, where we are not in
high debt, where we are not addicted to drugs, alcohol, sexual
perversions, or any kind self oriented tremendous obsessions.
This is a good thing to seek a decent and orderly life.
There is joy in moderation.
Still, Christ is showing us here that our top priority is not to be the
circumstances of our lives. Our
top priority is to be our relationship with God the Father; not
moderation in relationship with God.
We have a relationship with God the Father.
This has been established in Jesus Christ.
Through the Holy Spirit we are included in the very love within
God. And I know that this
is not something new to us in terms of news.
We have heard this. The
Scriptures show us more and more about what this means every time we
open them.
But we are being taught a very special lesson from
our Lord Jesus Christ:
Joy and moderation are important.
Your relationship with God the Father is important.
Make the decision in your heart that your top priority is how you relate
to our Father in heaven.
As this poor widow, realize that our lives are in the hands of God. And what God wants for us is to know Him personally in our
lives…as our top priority.
Let us pray….
Amen
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